Co-wrote with Anatoliy Gruzd, Philip Mai and Jenna Jacobson, this new report investigates political uses of social media by Canadians, a relevant topic as we approach the next federal election in Canada. The report covers:
- To what extent do online Canadian adults share and/or self-censor their political opinions on social media?
- Are online Canadian adults exposed to diverse views on social media?
- How comfortable are online Canadian adults with political actors examining and using their social media data?
The authors offer insight into the strategic practices of Canadians as they make use of social media for political purposes. Canadians are self-censoring, intentionally friending and following, and are concerned about how their social media data is being used. Notably, young Canadians are more intentional in their political social media use than their older counterparts.
This report is the third and final report based on a census-balanced survey of 1,500 Canadians using quota sampling by age, gender, and geographical region. The other two reports in this series are: The State of Social Media in Canada 2017 and Social Media Privacy in Canada. It was produced by the Social Media Lab, an interdisciplinary research lab at Ted Rogers School of Management, Ryerson University. The lab studies how social media is changing the ways in which people communicate, share information, conduct business and how these changes are impacting our society. The study is co-authored by Elizabeth Dubois at the University of Ottawa, and Anatoliy Gruzd, Philip Mai and Jenna Jacobson at Ryerson University.